theEdgeGleneagle’s Student VoiceVol. XV/ Number 10June 2, 2011

UPCOMING EVENTS

Saturday June 4Grad Dinner and Dance

Thursday June 9 Year End Concert Sunday June 19 Commencement

Ceremonies

Student excellence celebrated at year end ceremonies

Tweaking the nest: Grade 12 student fine-tunes the headpiece of birds for the scholarship board in the Coquitlam Centre Art Show. Zhu was awarded two scholarships for her original pieces. (SEE STORY PAGE 5)

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Izzy Doctostaff reporter

It was Oscars night last night as Gleneagle was filled with proud parents and camera flashes during the annual year end Awards Ceremony. Students were recognized for their excellent achievements during the school year.

“Awards night allows the school to celebrate the success of students. It also allows us to celebrate the success of par-ents and teachers who work well with their children or stu-dents,” explained Gerald Shong, principal.

Bindy Johal, counselor, explained how this year promot-ing the exemplary accomplishments of Gleneagle students was very important.

“We as teachers and staff…think it’s so fabulous that kids make honour roll and participate in clubs and athletics,” she said.

Tammy Ough, counselor agreed. “We just want parents and teachers to be able to come together and celebrate those kids who have been doing amazing work.”

Under the guidance of the Master of Ceremonies, Andrew Lloyd, social studies teacher, major awards and awards for each subject were handed down to the deserving students.

Academic awards were presented to the top student in each grade. The winners were Kimberley Chang, grade 12, Paolo Mercado, grade 11, Won Tae Lee, grade 10 and Joyce Chang, grade 9.

Academic athlete awards were given in recognition of great work in academics and participation in sports. The winners were Kimberley Chang and Michal Jurkowski, grade 12, Kathleen Chu, Jessica Jazdarehee and Jonathan Tan, grade 11, Andrew Chang and Kristyn Zoschke, grade 10 and Hannah Tvergyak and Ryan Arce, grade 9.

Winners for subject awards were chosen based on overall subject excellence within each course.

“I think some students are going to do well with or without rewards, and [for] others I think that is an incentive for them… it depends on the individual student,” commented Johal.

“I would hope that they have intrinsic motivation to do well,” explained Shong. “There are definitely advantages to doing well in school… but it’s more just a celebration...than an incentive,” he added.

This year, the qualifications for receiving subject awards acquired some minor adjustments.

“The reason we’re doing that is because some courses have a lot of different teachers and it’s uncomfortable for one teacher to say their student is better than someone else’s student when they maybe mark differently or teach differ-ently,” explained Shong.

Last year, the minimum awards a student had to obtain in order to be invited to the year end Awards Ceremony were two.

This year, the minimum was brought down to one, in order to recognize the great accomplishments of more students.

The students were also encouraged to play up their ward-robe with smart-casual attire.

“It’s such a special night and the parents are so proud of their kids, so it’s always nice to dress up for the occasion,” said Johal.

The evening also included a musical performance by Bryan Jackson, guitar teacher, with a few Gleneagle students.

Graduating class of 2011 shoots towards Starry Nights

With the grad dinner and dance less than three days away, emotions run high as most grade 12’s are gearing up for their big day with enthusiasm. “I’m nervous and excited at the same time,” said Antoinette Lee, grade 12, “both for the dinner and dance, and after-grad.”

Taking place this Saturday, June 4, at the Westin Bayshore, downtown, many students are making reservations for limos and spe-cial transportation with their friends. “My friends and I are going by limo,” said Jeresa Li, grade 12. “With two hours to get down-town, we are planning to go to Stanley Park to take pictures, and go around downtown for fun.” Others prefer to travel alone for convenience’s sake.

This year’s after-grad theme is Starry Nights. The meticulous and detailed plan-ning was not an issue for this year’s 11-mem-bered grad committee, according to Mark Liao, the teacher in charge of this group of students. “The planning was very smooth,” said Liao. “The students were broken up into sub-groups, and different groups had their own area of responsibility; for example, ho-tels, fundraising, P.R, music and decorating.” Liao praised the committee for the smooth

sailing of each part of the planning process. “This is why I handpick the group,” said Liao. “I try to pick a group of students who were known to get the job done.”

For many students, another exciting aspect of grad is the awards, including the coveted Talon and Eagle Awards. These awards are presented at the Commencement ceremony which will be held this year at the Orpheum Theatre on Sunday, June 19.

A huge honour for a graduate is to be cho-sen as class valedictorian. The Valedictory Address will also be given at Commence-ment. The nominees for valedictorian gave their speech for the prompt “Believe” this past Tuesday, and the top four nominees were Reza Sheikhzadeh, Jacquie Bolster, Erin Bodin, and Steven Black. The valedic-torian will be announced tomorrow.

Bindy Johal, head counselor, said “I believe that the valedictorian should be someone who is well respected among their peers, someone who is a good citizen, and someone who is comfortable speaking for and in front of this graduating class.”

Post secondary education at a university, college or technical institute is a scary but anticipated goal for many of the grads, but it comes at a hefty price. There are numerous scholarships that help students achieve their dream education, but Johal feels students are not taking advantage of these sources.

“There are entrance scholarships and applied scholarships,” said Johal.

“Entrance scholarships are automatically given if the university finds the student outstanding, but applied scholarships are only given to students that apply and qual-ify. There are many exceptional students in this graduating class, but the problem is not enough students apply. ” She hopes this will serve as advice for future graduates.

“High school was a maturing experience for me,” said John Kim, grade 12. “I started to realize the reasons for which I study and pursue higher education.” As an internation-al student, he speaks for a major group of the student body. “I have been here just under eight years, which is unusual for an interna-tional student,” said Kim. “Initially I felt in-timidated and restrained by my inadequacy with the English language. However, if I had not felt that way, I do not think I would’ve had the same motivations and incentive for striving to become fluent.”

After applying for numerous schools in the US, he chose University of California, Los Angeles to pursue a career in business. “As an international student, I know that most of us have had to deal with certain sacrifices and hardships,” said Kim, “whether it’s separa-tion from family, adjusting to a new setting, or learning a new language. Being an interna-tional student is a privilege; not many people

are blessed with the opportunities that are provided to us. Whether or not we take ad-vantage of those opportunities is up to us.”

“I feel like I’m ready to move on,” said Bolster. “I’ll miss Gleneagle, but I’m ready and excited to move on to bigger things.” As the school year is drawing to a close, this is probably what is going through every grad’s mind. “High school made me less afraid of getting to know other people,” said Bolster. When asked about advice she would give un-derclassmen, she said “People are open and welcoming if you let them be. Have as much fun as you can, get involved, make friends, [and] enjoy yourself.”

Evangeline Shihstaff reporter

INSIDE : Student film celebrated at festival today 5 Gleneagle golfers tee off at BC Championships 7

The EdgeJune 2, 20112 Opinion

theEdgeGleneagle Secondary

1195 Lansdowne DriveCoquitlam, BC, Canada

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fax 604 464-5796theedge@sd43.bc.ca

The Edge is the independent voice of the students of Gleneagle Secondary produced by the Journalism 11/12 class. It conforms and adheres to the standards and style of the Canadian Press.

Letters to the editor are welcome and will be printed as space allows; letters must be signed and

free of libel. The Edge reserves the right to edit for accuracy, spelling, and grammar.

Additional articles, opinion pieces, and features may also be submitted and will be printed as space allows. The Edge reserves the right to edit any submitted material for brevity and style.

Member of the Quilland Scroll SocietyInternational First PlaceAward Winner: 1999, 2003,2009George H. Gallup AwardWinner: 2000-02, 2004-06

AdvisorsLois AxfordKelly CooperAryn Gunn

StaffTamara BabcockSteven BaeKevin CawthraIsabelle DoctoHelen DooCassie Gibbons-BaratelliMariana GorjãoYoumy HanAndrea KlassenMacy LaoMicah Lao

Pauline MacapagalJosh PattenEmma RobertsEvangeline Shih

Additional staffYilin Wang

High school still has impact after graduation

Combatting laziness with productivity during summer

edge columnist

The worst part about summer vacation is the feeling you get, at the beginning of July, when you realize that it’s all going to be over in two months. You have only 60-odd days to soak up your freedom before you have to get back to whatever you’re getting back to.

In a way, the beginning of June almost has an easier feel-ing to it, like you’re watching the clock, waiting for the school days to run out, restless out of your mind and ready to break free of routine.

But why do we wait in anticipation for school to end? Why, even since the end of winter break, do we want so desper-ately to get out of school and jump into summer?

In high school, it’s really easy to feel like you’re just fol-lowing the same path as everyone else, that you’re just mov-ing along like we’re supposed to, that it’s not really your life. It’s really easy to feel like you’re not really living so much as you’re filling in the blanks of what someone else has writ-ten for you.

Summer is a breath of fresh air; we really get a taste of what feels a lot like freedom. We realize what we want to do and we can actually, for the most part, do it. We’re almost desperate to just get it out of our system.

But we forget that it’s still our life. We’re still making choices and decisions, and despite how predictable it can become, we’re still shaping our experiences and our char-acter and learning every single day.

And we take that with us everywhere and always because it becomes a part of us. There’s no way that four years, re-strictive or mundane or not, don’t shape us, because they do. They shape us in a way that we don’t really understand yet.

So whether you’re coming back for another year or two or three, or you’re leaving to get to wherever you’re headed, you have to remember to leave behind everything that you don’t really need (drama, stress, all that negative stuff), and take with you everything that makes high school somehow enjoyable.

Because even if you hate it here, even if you’re planning

never to ever touch a pencil again once you cross that stage and you’re handed a diploma, you can’t deny that high school forces you to decide what you’re going to do after high school. It’s a stepping stone to something else, a step-

ping stone that’s undervalued in its impact. High school is our life for four years, and after that we’re kind of forced to decide what kind of person we are and what that means before we do anything else.

Summer! Summer! Summer! It is June and it’s finally exam month. This month is always the most hectic, tiring, and stressful month of the whole school year.

But before too long, exams will be part of the past and we’ll all be anticipating the wonderful days of summer vacation ahead.

Paint a picture in your head. You’re on the beach feeling the breeze

pushing you back as you walk along the coast, listening to the waves lapping on the

shore, smelling the fresh air and the freshly cut grass.

Yes, it’s a lovely scenario isn’t it? So please do not sit around at home just thinking about it.

DO IT. We have two months of summer vacation,

so please do not waste it just staying in the house with a laptop in front of you.

I suggest that you go out there, and have as many adventures as you can. Perhaps start now.

Look for a job or volunteer work. Jobs may be competitive, but if there is a will, there

is a way.Doing nothing productive during the

summer is not going to get you anywhere, and I really think it’s not healthy for our bodies to be lazy all day.

Last summer, I didn’t do any volunteer-ing or work, so what else was there for

me to do? I’d wake up so late in the day, perhaps past

noon, and what would I accomplish that day? Eating, watching TV, going on the in-ternet, sleeping late? Yes, it’s a nice, relaxing day, yet, what have I done, really?

Statistics show that 26% of the youth in our generation are physically weaker than youth ten years ago.

This worries me. I do not want our gen-eration to lower our health standards, or lose interest in other physical activities.

Yes, our summer vacation is the time to relax from the stress we put upon our-

selves during school, but we should also keep in mind that summer is also a time for us to explore and discover things that we are not able to do during the regular school year.

If one is too lazy to head outside and pre-fer to stay at home, why not choose to read a book for the fun of it?

I would also suggest walking in the park. Just enjoying the weather along with beau-tiful scenery during the summer is some-thing we should not take for granted, be-cause when else do we get to spend a full day in sunshine, right?

Not to sound like a hypocrite, I may not accomplish all my own goals. I may not get hired right away, or I may be too lazy to go out for a jog at Lafarge, but at least I have the initiative to do something active during my vacation.

Summer should not be taken for granted; it’s the only time of the year that we have two full months off, so I really want to make my summer meaningful enough to remem-ber, so that ten years from now, I can say that I enjoyed it.

I suggest that you go out there, and have as many adventures as you can

The Edge June 2, 2011 3Commentary

YOU SAID

IT!

What is your favourite memory of Gleneagle?

grade 12“Hanging out at the lockers with

TJ McLean, just playing Hacky sack and listening to his boom box.”

grade 12“My friends; I’m so glad I spent

my time here with them.”

grade 12“When I wrestled as a member of

Gleneagle’s wrestling team.”

grade 12“I think it’s actually coming here

in the first place.”

The school year is coming to a close. The grad class of 2011 is anxiously awaiting the day when they will finally be able to walk across the stage and accept their high school diploma in front of their family and friends. But not everyone is so excited.

Graduation celebration worthwhile after many years of education

Edge Columnist

For the past few months I have heard many people talking about how high school grad “isn’t such a big deal” and not really worth so much celebration.

I’ve listened to classmates and even my own family arguing that the expenses involved in the grad dinner-dance aren’t worth the experience, since high school graduation is nothing compared to that of a post-secondary institution. And I can understand their points. However, I strongly disagree.

Ever since we were five years old—or younger, for some of us—we’ve been at-tending school every weekday for 10 months of the year. We are forced to wake up early, pack a lunch, and lug our heavy backpacks to school. I can’t even begin to count the hours I’ve spent in the classroom, or the number of homework assignments I’ve completed over the years.

Each time summer comes around, I’ve al-ways felt like a tiny victory has been won, a small milestone reached. But after the two short summer months of bliss, we’re all carted back to school where our boring, monotonous routine begins again, and it

feels like our small victory was for nothing.For 13 years we’ve endured school, but it

wasn’t exactly time wasted. We’ve learned about algebra and geometry, physics and biology, Canadian history, and the English language. We’ve studied Shakespearean plays, taken language classes, and learned about World War II. And if I ever need to calculate the length of the hypotenuse in a right-angle triangle, I’ll be well-armed with my knowledge of Pythagoras’ Theorem.

Some of my biggest achievements thus far have happened through school, and it has had an enormous impact on my life.

I think these achievements deserve to be recognized. It’s true that most people graduate from high school, as long as they make an effort to dot their “i”s and cross their “t”s. It’s obviously not a competitive achievement. But it’s still an achievement. To me, graduation isn’t celebrating the fact that I completed all the required courses. It’s celebrating the fact that I worked hard to get to where I am today, and it recognizes all that I’ve accomplished.

In addition to recognizing 13 years of hard work, graduation also doubles as a “coming

of age” party. Since most of us are turn-ing 18 sometime in 2011, it marks the time when we become adults and enter into the real world. For the first time, we’re forced to make our own decisions about which direc-tion we want our lives to take. I think this is a significant, albeit intimidating change that deserves to be celebrated, and grad provides the perfect opportunity.

It’s true that the costs of the dinner-dance can easily get out of hand. But for those of us moving on to post-secondary school, there won’t be too many chances in the near future where we’re able to party and cel-ebrate for a night with the people we grew up with.

I think we deserve a chance to bid our childhood years farewell with our clos-est friends. It’s more than just a boring, meaningless obligation that our parents force us to participate in.

It’s a recognition of all the hard work and tireless effort we’ve put into our educa-tion so far, a recognition of all those small milestones we reached after each year of grade school. And I think this celebration is very worthwhile.

Letters to the editor: [Re: “Royal wedding overdone, overly expensive, wasteful”]

Dear Cassie Gibbons,I strongly agree with your statement about how the royal wedding was overpriced, over

exaggerated, and wasteful. The only reason half the world tuned in was to see some sort of “history,” but it’s not—people with money can attract anyone. Sure they were royalty, but you don’t need to invite half the world’s politicians who you don’t even know, and Lady Gaga, and what’s his name…Elton John, yeah, that guy. Costing millions, plunging Eng-land into debt, all for one man and one woman to kiss, hold hands, and that’s basically it. It’s all a show for nothing.

-Arman Bondar and Mitch Howey

[Re: “Penny dilemmas: keep or discard? That is the question”]

Even though the penny has a low value, it’s still money. After collecting a bunch of change, you can keep it in a jar and, eventually, in a savings account. It may not seem like a lot, but it accumulates. You’ll be surprised by how much money you can collect in a year just by picking up change off the floor.

- Marvin Dejasco

[Re: “Somewhat paradoxical: when death becomes reason to celebrate”]

Overcoming differences is easier said than done. I do strongly agree with your statement, “Even though cultures may be different, the idea is to accept them.” However, society itself these days still does not get the idea. Many novels and stories contain that clichéd moral, and many parents tell that to their children themselves, but no one is putting it into action; therefore, I’m glad you chose to write about the celebration of death, and how we need to make the world better. I hope many people will realize the truth that’s been hanging in front of them for their entire lives; they just need to open their eyes.

- Joyce Chang

I found Gibbon’s article rather blunt and ignorant. First off, of course the royal wedding was going to be extravagant and “overdone,” as it is the English monarchy. England is known for its monarchy, which brings much media and tourism to their country. A wed-ding for a future king is not going to be a cheap ordeal. English citizens only pay around 66 pence annually in taxes towards monarchy, which is a very insignificant amount. The majority of wedding costs most likely came from the royal family’s money; therefore, it was their decision to go “over the top.” The royal wedding was also, of course, going to be surrounded by media—it was a historical event that brought much pride and nationalism throughout England.

-Natasha Rambaran

I agree with what Cassie Gibbons said, “a wedding is something that is supposed to be shared within a circle of close friends and family.” Yes it is overly expensive, but I do not think it is wasteful. I think they want the whole world to their wedding because I think all of us are their family or we are their friends; they want us to know that they are loving each other, and they want us to give them our happiness, our love, and our support.

-Rodica Jasper

The EdgeJune 2, 20114 News

Greater good more important than minor discomfortAndrea Klassenstaff reporter

Saving lives has never been so easy. Up to 33 lives were saved two

weeks ago by Gleneagle students who donated a little of their time and 450 ml of their blood to help people all over B.C. who need it more.

“There is a shortage of blood in the province,” said organizer and

teacher Peri Morenz. “Our hospitals have to borrow

blood from other provinces, and only three percent of people who can donate blood do.”

“I wasn’t looking forward to it,” said grade 11 student Clare Chiu, “but I focused on why I was doing this and all the people I was help-ing, and it was over in a flash.”

Blood donation takes only an hour of your time in all. “Since I have blood I can share it. Why not?” said Ariana Vaisey, grade 11.

TALONS In-depth Night exhibits unique learning of gifted programMariana Gorjãostaff reporter

Gleneagle’s TALONS program hosted In-depth Night last Monday, their final event for this year.

The TALONS students had been chal-lenged to “know something about every-thing and everything about something,” said Quirien Mulder ten Kate, TALONS teacher.

“In school you are usually taught about many subjects. In this project, the goal is to learn a great deal about one field of activ-ity...become an expert.” she said.

Students had been working on their In-depth project for five months. They kept bi-weekly posts on their individual blogs to demonstrate their progress.

“TALONS learners explore their passions for learning in their blogs,” said Mulder.

The event was held in the multipurpose room. Some of the Talons had their proj-ects in displays, but there were also “perfor-mances from the students who have done more active things like dance,” explained, Kelsey Williams, grade 9, also the MC of the In-depth Night.

Liam St. Louis, grade 10, presented a “movie of me and someone else sparring. My In-depth project was medieval sword fighting. I take classes at a place down-town,” he explained.

“I started it a couple of months before In-depth and I was just getting into it. It’s real-ly fun to just start holding a rapier from the fifteenth century, learning techniques, and all the different things you can do, and dis-cover new skills. The [rapier] can be sharp though; I have a few injuries from them,” St. Louis said.

The projects went from food carving, by

Imagine a world without money: some students do Josh Pattenstaff reporter

An international movement that includes millions all over the globe is alive and well here amongst stu-dents at Gleneagle. The movement is none other than the Zeitgeist Movement.

The Zeitgeist movement is a movement that was started with the release of the documentary film Zeitgeist: Addendum, which was a sequel to the film Zeitgeist: The Movie.

The concepts of the series, and ultimately the movement, are for current civilization to evolve, for surrounding conditions in society to change, and for human civiliza-tion to achieve a “resource-based economy,” rather than one based

on the monetary system.The Zeitgeist Movement is a

branch of the larger Venus Proj-ect, directed by Jacque Fresco.

Fresco travels the world giving lectures, teaching people, and promoting the Venus Project. Ac-cording to Pedram Milani, grade 11, “money creates separation be-tween people, and desperation.”

“Right now is the very begin-ning of a worldwide social move-ment. Organizations like the Zeitgeist Movement and The Free World Charter are out there try-ing to spread these ideas, increase awareness about the flaws of the monetary [system] and the prob-lems it causes, and promote a bet-ter alternative for humanity,” said Eric Milligan, grade 11.

“The monetary system, almost all social problems are either di-

rectly or indirectly caused by it,” Milligan added.

“It stands in the way of our abil-ity to solve all of the major prob-lems facing us today, such as the energy crisis, poverty, overpopu-lation, climate change and desta-bilization of the earth’s natural systems.”

According to the ideals of the Zeitgeist Movement, the monetary system is not necessary in today’s civilization now that we have the technology available to us to pro-vide resources to meet the needs of all people on the planet.

In the beginning of the film Zeitgeist: Moving Forward, Fresco describes how all the resources and money used in World War II for combat could’ve provided necessities for the whole world, rather than be responsible for one

of the most destructive periods in human history.

The people in the Zeitgeist movement use this as an example of why the current system has to go, and change is imminent.

“There are countless flaws with the monetary system...With the knowledge and technology we have today, we have evolved be-yond any need for money and the survival of our species depends on our ability to progress beyond it,” said Milligan.

With a resource-based economy, rather than one based on profit, people would no longer feel the need to compete and take away from others to be better off.

According to Milani, change may start right in our own society.

“Our society itself is corrupt, un-fair, and unjust,” said Milani. “It

is also fixed for society’s puppets,” he added.

“Violence, crime, and more [strife] comes from money. As the saying goes, ‘capital punishment, for those without any capital.’ Without capital, we would be left with the option only to strive and succeed, and violent crimes would go down,” said Milani.

“Crimes based on robbery, theft, and others would no longer be a virtue,” he added.

Regularly, the local chapter of the Zeitgeist Movement, Zeitgeist Vancouver, hosts meetings on the street outside the Vancouver Art Gallery every Saturday from 11 am, to 5 pm.

“When I am older I plan to con-tribute a lot more and dedicate a good portion of my life to this cause,” said Milligan.

“Overall it went well, except for the fact I almost fainted after, but all the nurses were really nice and took care of me,” Vaisey said.

The feeling of being well taken care of was echoed by Chiu. “They gave us blankets and juice and just made sure that we had the best ex-perience possible,” she said.

Morenz said “It was just a trial run to see how the experience would go, but we had to book even more appointments than we had because so many students

were interested and that was re-ally exciting.”

“Most people don’t understand how easy it is to do and how many people are helped by the simple act of giving blood,” said Chiu.

Vaisey said, “I just helped to save over three lives!”

According to Canadian Blood Services, a Canadian needs blood every minute of every day and that adds up.

There will be a new clinic open-ing next year much closer to the

school so that students can go during an off block or lunch and not have to take the shuttle, ac-cording to Morenz.

“It opens a lot more doors for more students to donate,” said Morenz.

“We are aiming for 50 grade 12’s to donate in the next year,” said Morenz

“I am definitely doing it again,” said Vaisey.

“And they gave us cookies!” fin-ished Chiu.

Jason Fong, grade 10, to wire crochet, by Louise Liao, grade 9.

Owen Tindel, grade 10, decided to do computer programing.

“In our technology oriented world, com-puter programming is a extremely useful skill to have,” he explained.

“I’m studying two languages for comput-er programming: C and C++. For C I am programing a robot. I programmed it to do many things: move around, move towards the light source. I even taught it to do math. You just type the commands in the comput-er and send it to the robot. The robot does what it’s told to do,” Tindel added.

“[Each student’s project] had to be person-al; if it’s not personal then it’s really easy for the person to get bored or annoyed,” said Williams.

“We had to meet a mentor; most of us have found someone but others have learned on-line,” he added.

“I decided I wanted to do contortionism,” said Chelsea Henderson, grade 9. “My friend is friends with someone who did gymnastics. She’s very good so she’s been helping me out. I’ve made a lot of progress and I’ve been really happy with how much I’ve been able to accomplish.”

Near the end of the night, both TAL-

ONS teachers, Mulder and Bryan Jackson, called to the stage the recipients of the Spirit Awards; Daniel Luo, grade 9, Iris Hung, grade 9, Rebecca MacDonald, grade 10 and the recipients of the Academic Awards; Me-gan Edmunds, grade 9 and Liam St.Louis, grade 10.

As the evening was coming to an end Donya Pourtaghi, grade 10 and Andrew Chang, grade 10, each gave a speech to their teachers, Mulder and Bryan Jackson.

After that all of the TALONS classes got together and sang an adapted version of Home by Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros.

Testing the metal: Grade 10 student models his fencing technique for a parent at the Talons In-depth night on Monday. TALONS students presented their learning in a variety of ways at this annual event.

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The Edge June 2, 2011 5News

As you are reading this story, Gleneagle’s COAST students are out in the wilderness, facing their longest and most challenging trip of the year. They left on Tuesday, May 24, and will be coming back tomorrow, af-ter completing an 11-day canoe trip to Bow-ron Lakes.

The Bowron Lakes trip is a traditional event for COAST and has been going on for approximately 10 years. As the second last trip of the year, the class is scheduled to participate in several activities, including spending a night on their own in the wild, having a tour at the Historic Hat Creek Ranch located on the Caribou Gold Rush trail, visiting the infamous Barkerville, and spending seven and a half days paddling the Bowron Lakes.

“The kids are going to get a lot of expo-sure to BC history… [and they] really get to test the skills they’ve been honing for the first four trips,” said COAST teacher Adam Hayes.

The students were looking forward to this trip, and started preparing a week before

Gleneagle film makers are debuting origi-nal movies at a film festival today at Heri-tage Woods Secondary School.

“Reel Stars Film Festival is an SD43 Film Festival that allows students to [enter] films in multiple categories,” said Jodey Udell, Digital Media teacher.

The festival is a yearly event when students from the Coquitlam district come together in celebration of student films. It can vary from “animation, documentary, narrative drama, narrative comedy, music videos and experimental,” Udell said.

This is “to give kids some exposure for their films, to try to give them a chance to get them out to a larger audience,” said Udell. “Most of them would have done their films through either Film and TV class, Digital Media class, or Animation class.”

“Only one student entered a film who wasn’t currently in one of my classes, but he has already been in three of my classes,” he said.

“It was a really cool experience because it was cool to go against people who were competing in the same level as I was,” said Chelsea Forster, grade 11.

Forster has entered the Festival before and she “wanted another chance” because she won in a category last year.

“The reason is because I want my art watched, seen or heard and it’s a place where students can come together to show their art work with one another,” she explained.

During this year’s spring break, Forster went to Cuba with the music department tour. Her entry is a documentary called The Cuba Project.

“The centre of the documentary was the cultural differences and similarities be-

Gleneagle has walked away with the Top Male and Female Artist scholarship awards at the annual Coquitlam Centre Art Show.

Shaelyn Zhu and her fellow art-ist Aaron Campbell, both grade 12, were awarded the Top Female Artist and Top Male Artist schol-arships of $750 from the Canadian Federation of University Women. Along with Gerri Jin, grade 12, Campbell and Zhu submitted their artwork as the three nota-ble nominees of the scholarship from Gleneagle.

Aryn Gunn, graphics and pho-tography teacher, Melanie Stokes, drawing and painting teacher, and Mike McElgunn, ceramics and photography teacher, played a huge role supporting the students as they assembled their pieces of art for the show.

“Every school will promote three students for a scholarship, so these three students are making their work available for a jury,” Gunn explained. “Coquitlam Centre gives one student from each school a $500 scholarship.” Zhu was the winner of this scholarship as well.

Gleneagle was joined by Heritage Woods, Charles Best, Centennial, Riverside, and Port Moody, each of which presented examples of

Youmy Hanstaff reporter

Micah Laostaff reporter

Gleneagle maintains dominance at art show

Student talent in limelight at Reel Stars Film Festival

the type of work that the students had been doing in art over the past year. Through this process, Camp-bell, Jin, and Zhu presented their artwork for Gleneagle’s scholar-ship boards, featuring different styles of art.

As a digital artist, Campbell en-joys incorporating digital art and Photoshop as opposed to painting. “A lot of my pieces have a concept to them, like [a person] is afraid of spiders, the Photoshop [icons turned into] people break-danc-ing,” he commented. “I play on situations and words, like a cam-eraman is literally a cameraman.”

Zhu, on the other hand, finds her passion in art through fash-ion design. “I always want to push the boundary of fashion because I think fashion isn’t just a com-mercial product, but can also be meaningful art pieces,” said Zhu. “I find that birds are so mysteri-ous…sometimes they appear in realistic form, and sometimes they are more abstract.”

Jin finds her strength in draw-ing and painting, bringing out the cartoonish flare with the tip of her pen.

“I like to use things that are quite weird,” Jin explained, “strange [things], and turn them into stuff that you wouldn’t normally see or wouldn’t fit into a particular cat-egory.”

“Most of the show at the mall is a

showcase of excellence in second-ary art as demonstrated by two boards of artwork from the major-ity of the secondary schools in the district,” Gunn commented. “It involves lots of different students from all grade levels.”

Several students who received

the opportunity to visit the scholarship boards of the sec-ondary schools were thoroughly impressed.

“I felt the artwork was sparse this year,” said Ashley Tam, grade 12. “The mall’s cut down on view-ing space was upsetting because it

left less opportunity to see more fantastic art. Out of all the schol-arship boards, Gleneagle’s was by far the best!”

“It was amazing to find out how many talented art students we have in Gleneagle,” added Yea Jin Kwon, grade 12.

Seeing ‘normal’ in new ways: Grade 12 student interprets nature with unique vision through her drawing and painting. She was one of three students nominated for a scholarship.

Pauline Macapagalstaff reporter

the actual event. They received work sheets to organize the food they were going to have on camping nights, and a list of items they needed to bring on the trip. They also prac-ticed canoeing and kayaking.

“I’d like to show the kids what’s it’s really like to be in a part of nature,” said COAST teacher Krista Bogen. “People in guiding industries know that after three days, a per-son begins to relax into wildlife,” explained Bogen. “Most of our trips have been three days maximum; they haven’t had that ex-perience yet. So this will be their chance,” she added.

“We’re really going to get in touch with outdoors,” said COAST student Parham Laghaei. “We’re all just going to bond.”

Hayes described the class as “a great group.”

“They really care about each other, which has been a great strength of theirs,” said Hayes. “I don’t expect it to be without any hitches. I expect, as we had with every one of our trips, there’s always something that happens, or comes up,” he added.

“It’s the best program in the world. It ex-tends your comfort zone,” said COAST stu-dent Alice Zhu. “I can try other stuff that I’ve never tried before.”

tween our culture and theirs [along] with the experiences that the students and teach-ers came across,” she said.

“One of the main locations was [at] one of the schools. When we went there, we were dancing and singing together ... these kids from two very different cultures,” said Forster.

“They were working together really well, and it was an amazing feeling to be in that because you’d think that there are a lot of things that are very different there,” she added.

On the other hand, this is grade 11 Liam Krider’s first time to enter the Fes-tival. “I have always been into making films,” he said.

“Usually, I like to make comedies, but I wanted to make something different this time, so I made a drama and it was about drinking and driving,” he elaborated.

“Originally, it was going to be a PSA (Pub-lic Service Announcement), but it ended up being too long, so I decided to make it a drama,” Krider said.

“Shilp [Vaishnav, grade 12], and I were partners for a project, back when we were in Mr. Udell’s class and so we decided to en-ter. We made it a year ago and we wanted to see how it would do,” said Jeff Huggins, grade 12.

[The film] was called Tracked and it was a trailer for a movie that we never made. It was about a guy on the run from a secret society,” Huggins said.

“We had a good time finding locations for filming like broken warehouses, find-ing actors, script writing and everything,” he said.

“It was a cool experience. It’s probably the best video that I made,” Huggins commented.

“It is a great thing for kids to try to do. I specifically put things in my courses di-

COAST goes one on one with nature on 11-day trip

rectly for it; we always want to make sure it runs,” Udell said.

“I took ICT 9, ICT 10 and Digital Media 11. We learned how to use ‘Final Cut’ [soft-ware] which was so helpful for me. I edit a lot of movies,” said Huggins.

“Digital Media and Digital Film Making helped me to plan ahead instead of just im-

provising,” Forster said. “It’s more of a celebration of films as op-

posed to a competition,” said Udell. “For us it’s really a collaborative thing…so if we get everyone involved, it’s great,” he added.

Udell sees a lot of potential in the festival. “It’s emerging,” he said.

The show runs from 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.

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The EdgeJune 2, 20116 Features

Body as artist’s canvas: allure of piercings, tattoosCassie Baratellistaff reporter

A new trend or an ancient tradition? Piercing has been around for a long time, whether it was for a rite of passage, to look good, or just to annoy your parents. Pierc-ings are a come-and-go trend and have been for years.

“A lot of kids now are getting piercings and tattoos, but if you look at the previous generation before us …, they didn’t really have tattoos or piercings,” said Mika Speed, grade 10. This generation is known for its crazy statements and risky looks.

“People I guess make fun of them, but over time, they just get used to it, right?” said Speed. “Kids get piercings done so they can be like ‘look at me,” she added. “Sometimes kids get piercings to make statements,” add-ed Speed. “Like ‘I have piercings, I look like a rebel’ but over time it does come and go.”

Piercings are a fashion trend of late and you see more risky kinds of piercings, such as nipple piercings, and meaningless tat-toos. “Tattoos should be meaningful… they should have a story behind them,” said Speed.

“Most people come in for something meaningful, but we do have the people who are trying to be spontaneous and we do try to discourage them,” said downtown Next manager, Jacob Johnson.

Because of the popularity of tattoos and piercings, jobs in the industry are growing. Next offers a three-stage piercing course for people who want to learn more about pierc-ing safely.

“I think it’s a great job for people, and it branches off into other things. You’re a piercer, you’re a salesperson, a sterile tech-

Fashion, or cultural statement?: Grade 10 proudly displays her tattoo of a dove. The tattoo contains the initials of her grandparent.

There comes a day in every teenagers’ life, where a com-paratively restricted high school life meets with the big blue yonder of life after graduation.

Some students broaden their horizons even before they graduate by studying abroad.

“I turned 18 during the time that I was in France,” said Erin Kipps, a former student who studied in France for one year through Youth Rotary. “The experience was great and really opened my eyes to different cultures and view-points.”

The reasons many have for wanting to go abroad after graduation are basically the same: the freedom of being away from family, the freshness of the culture and environ-ment, and the adventurous feeling of being in a totally dif-ferent country.

“I simply attended the local high school in the city that I was placed – Lille, France,” said Kipps. “I did have some se-lection regarding exact classes, etc. Most classes were pretty standard, but I was also able to take a Spanish class, being taught in French!”

Louisa Hardjasa, grade 12 student from Gleneagle, chose to study in Japan because of the influence of her two sis-ters. “Before I went, they each had done their own little exchanges,” said Hardjasa.

“My eldest sister went to teach English in Japan for a sum-mer, and my other sister went to work for a year on co-op a few years ago. When my other sister went, it kind of felt like it was ‘my turn’ to go. It seems like an impossible feat for most pre-graduates. “One of the biggest things that I prepared for was the language barrier,” said Kipps.

“In preparation for the year abroad, I found a French tu-tor and took courses three days a week for approximately six months.”

It is the most basic tool of survival anywhere, being able

one which had a reasonable price, they suddenly cancelled everything on me in October due to ‘complications’ with their branch partner in Japan. All that work went down the drain, and I was lost on what to do.”

Luckily, she found out about Youth for Understanding, one of the larger foreign exchange companies. “The golden rule in exchange is to ‘expect nothing, and you’ll never be disappointed,’” said Hardjasa. “It’s a very hard perspective to keep, but it’s nevertheless very true,” she added.

There are many other problems, like how to adjust to cul-tural shock. “I found that I just needed to be open-minded and try to learn and understand why things were done as they were,” said Kipps. “The people I met during my year abroad were very warm and open to helping me through

this process.”Hardjasa, who stayed in Japan for ten months, said “the

most challenging and disorienting part of my exchange was the change in family. My real family is a relaxed, easy-go-ing household with few rules and lots of freedom. My host family was very strict. Being unproductive was not easily forgiven in my host family.”

Many cultural customs are left unsaid because it has been part of tradition and society over many periods of time. This often leaves foreigners between a rock and a hard place. “I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what was okay and not okay to do,” said Hardjasa. Going this route is never easy; you have to be open to changes and unfamiliar situations, be willing to adjust and compromise. “I could easily say the experience has changed my life forever,” said Hardjasa. “The experience has changed and shaped my am-bitions and dreams for the future.”

Once you’ve set your heart on this path, the experiences you have will be once in a lifetime.

nician, you could go into nursing,” said Johnson. “I kind of stumbled into it, I guess. I mean I got my bellybutton pierced when I was fifteen but then I didn’t get many more piercings until I was 18. My brother is a tat-too artist so that’s how I kind of stumbled into it.”

Piercing as a career now seems to be a great idea – as long as you know what you’re doing and you have the connections to get known.

“You can make a lot of money if you know the right people or the right area and you’re good at it, and you have a passion for it. If you have a passion for piercing, I would say go for it. Tattooing is a little bit different; you have to have an art passion and you have to have a steady hand,” said Speed.

“Most people that get piercings do it for fun. Honestly, when I get my piercings done I get bored of them, and it gets addicting. The more piercings I have, the more I want. It’s also really hard to do that because it costs so much money,” said Speed.

“It’s more popular these days to do micro dermals. The price has come down a lot ac-tually, almost to the same price as a surface piercing,” said Johnson, confirming the fact that every type of piercing is getting more and more popular as this generation grows.

“Some days I might do only a few and oth-ers we might do thirty [piercings],” added Johnson.

So who makes up the clientele of the pierc-ing and tattoo industry? “Our main clien-tele is repeat and refer, because we have a ton of regulars,” said Johnson.

“I guess you could consider groups of people like emo and scene people as a really big trend for piercings because it makes you look at them,” said Speed.

“They’re just getting it done to get it done. I guess you could say that about the

nose, but if it compliments your body I see no problem.”

Piercings and tattoos will always be seen differently by different people and differ-

ent points of view, and what matters is what people like on themselves. People will al-ways get piercings and tattoos and society will always have its trends.

to communicate. This is where most students struggle, be-cause this takes the most preparation. Learning a language is not something that can be rushed; the intricacy and the detail requires patience to master, and even more so to be fluent.

So this is a very early choice to be made for a student looking to study abroad, which language does the country speak, and whether you are willing to put in the effort to learn that language.

“I couldn’t do most of the homework and exams,” said Hardjasa when asked about her school life, “but my teach-ers all gave me textbooks and encouraged me to participate, and my classmates were all unexpectedly friendly, so I was never alone.”

Kipps’ decision to study abroad was also influenced by family. “During my high school years, my parents became involved in hosting exchange students from abroad,” said Kipps.

“I was lucky as I was young when I finished grade 12, and was able to graduate with my class and was still eligible to participate in the Rotary Exchange for the year after.”

Arranging a one-year study program in high school is also a very good way to get the experience of studying abroad.

“As I was travelling through an established exchange stu-dent program (Youth Rotary), there was a lot of help and assistance with the preparation and even guidelines of what to expect and how to deal with it. They actually have a weeklong course for all of the exchange students prior to any of us travelling abroad,” Kipps said.

“I had a lot of problems when I first started,” said Hard-jasa. “I wanted to choose a program that put me in a host family so I could experience daily Japanese life. I started applications in January, but when I had finally chosen the

Evangeline Shihstaff reporter

Educational exchange allows students to gain world experience

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“I found that I just needed to be open-minded and try to learn and understand why things were done as they were”

The Edge June 2, 2011 7Sports

Who needs Tiger Woods, when Gleneagle has the best golfers in the Coquitlam school district, the Fraser Valley Zone and possibly the province?

Gleneagle put on a dazzling display, win-ning against other schools in the Districts and Fraser Valley Championships for both junior and senior divisions.

The senior team headed up to Kamloops this week for the provincial championships for the fourth year in a row, but results were not available at press time.

Brian Unger, head coach, feels that they could get the job done at provincials. “We’ve been there three years in a row, and we have the best golfers in the district and possibly Canada,” he said. Unger believes that they have a strong team. He says their best new-comer this year has been Duncan Priestly. “I liked the way [he] has played this year; he’s been practicing a lot and improving his game,” said Unger.

John Kim, grade 12, felt very confident be-fore the provincial championships. “It was somewhat expected, but still I feel pride in my school. However, our team’s goal never was getting into the provincials but win-ning it,” he said.

“I believe our team has more than enough to take the provincial champion title,” he added.

Brian Jung, grade 12, felt the exact same way going into the provincials. “I feel really proud of our team for making it to the pro-vincials four years in a row. It is obviously an awesome achievement by coach Unger and the school,” said Jung. “Yes, I believe we will

Provincial banner within reach for golf teamKevin Cawthrastaff reporter

Going for gold: Grade 11 student drives for success. The Talons competed for provincial honours in Kamloops this week. Both senior and junior golf teams delivered an impressive season, chalking up wins in districts and Fraser Valley competition.

The girls’ rugby team ended their season on a high, finishing sixth out of eight in tier 2 of the provincial championships.

“I really didn't know what to expect going into provincials,”

Three Gleneagle track and field ath-letes are moving on to the BC Provin-cials this coming Friday and Saturday. Nick Ayin and Hilda Leung, both

grade 12, and Hodson Harding, grade 11, all qualified in their events for the upcoming championship to be held at Swangard Stadium in Burnaby.

Leung will be competing in triple jump, Ayin will be running the 200-metre, and Harding will be participat-ing in both the 200-metre and the 400-metre events on June 3 and 4.

Billy Demonte, who has been coach-ing the sport for six years, describes the athletes as “very coachable.”

“They really love the sport, and it’s evident in the results,” she added.

Michele Morin, co-coach, expressed the resolve that the team had. “It really says something, to have that kind of determination regardless of the com-petition out there. We’ve had a really talented group this year,” she said.

Harding, who hadn’t been intro-duced to the sport before being en-couraged to join by Demonte and Morin last year, said he is ready for the challenge of provincials.

“I’m just really looking forward to good weather and running good times,” he said. “It’s been really good so far, to be able to have fun and improve so much. It’s been a fun season so far.”

Harding also says that his perfor-Leader of the pack: Grade 11 student will compete for Gleneagle at the provincial track competition in Burnaby this weekend.

Emma Robertsstaff reporter

Track & field athletes advance to provincials

Girls rugby defeats rival Port Moody at BC competitionSteven Baestaff reporter

said Alexis Latimer, grade 12 and team captain; the ladies only brought 14 members to provincials, while 15 play on the field.

“I knew my girls were tough but they exceeded my expectations,” she said.

The team, although just managing to enter as the eighth

seed, bumped up two spots to claim sixth place – one up from last year’s seventh place.

The ladies knocked down Port Moody Secondary – their main rivals of the season – but lost to Carson Graham and Semiamoo.

“We gave our all, and it was great to have such a mentally tough team by

my side,” Latimer rejoiced. “Our toughest competitors in

provincials were Carson because they had enough girls to field two teams and we didn't even have enough for one team,” she said. “But we played our hearts out and scored twice on them.”

Though this year does not boast

success in terms of medals or records, the team has a positive view of their season.

“It was a building season,” explained Shaelynn Zaurrini, grade 10, upbeat. “Almost everyone started fresh, so we improved on basically everything.”

“We went from pretty much knowing nothing to giving the top teams like Carson a run for their money,” agreed Veronica Robbins, grade 10.

Robbins said a close bond between the girls greatly contributed to their building success.

“We are very much a close team,” she said.

“We all vary in age but we are really close and it helps us a lot in this sport," she added.

Most of the players hope to be back bigger and better next season.

“We’re hoping for better numbers because we’re going on tour next year,” Zaurrini said. “We’re going to Hawaii and so we need numbers and we want to do well in provincials.”

Latimer admitted a lack of players hindered their performance. “Throughout our season we had a tough time getting enough girls to come out to practice and at our games we were just having enough to make up a team which was hard especially because we have so many new people,” she said.

“We want to win games,” said Zaurrini. “It’s hard when you have small numbers.”

“The season went amazing – far bet ter than expected,” Robbins concluded.

win the championship.”“Our season went great. We had a really

strong team and it showed. Every tournament I overheard other schools saying “Gleneagle’s going to win for sure....” and they weren’t wrong,” Kim said.

Jung agrees it has been a good year. “My season is going pretty well, both on my own career and the school team. I only played one

mance has improved since he first started.

“The first race he ran, he puked, be-cause he hadn’t been training prop-erly,” said Demonte.

“I’ve been doing a lot of cross-coun-try,” said Harding. “That’s definitely helped me a lot with my stamina.”

Morin said that, typically, track and field athletes all improve at different rates.

“Sometimes it depends on what’s happening personally in their lives, or how much stress they’re under,” she said. “Some improve, some don’t. It’s different for everyone,” she added.

“It’s harder to get students to join a sport like track and field, just because there are so many sports overlap-ping…and there are so many differ-ent events. And when everyone has other commitments, it’s definitely hard for consistency. That’s the dif-ficult part, I’d say—getting a team together and getting people out on the field,” Morin added.

Demonte urges students to give track and field a try. “Once students join, I find they really do enjoy it,” she said.

tournament for school, Fraser Valley, and I was third individual,” he said.

Unger believes with the young core still around for next year, Gleneagle could be a force. “We only have two seniors leaving us this year, so we will have most of our talent still intact for next year,” he said.

Jung hopes the young players will continue the winning record from previous years into

the future. “I hope that they will bring the same success since Gleneagle still [has] some young and talented players,” he said.

After high school, Jung for one, will still be striving to improve his game. “I will be pur-suing my dream of [becoming a ]professional golfer at Oregon State University. I am re-cruited by OSU and I will be playing for them starting this fall,” he said.

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The EdgeJune 2, 20118 Arts & Entertainment

Gleneagle’s concert band jazzed up last Saturday morning with a few tunes at Rocky Point Park.

It is a district concert band festi-val and is a new tradition emerg-ing in the past few years.

Held May 28, secondary and middle schools from all over the Tri-cities came and performed for guests at the band shell.

“It’s a celebration. It’s great and a fun, fun day and is well received by the public,” said Ed Trovato, the music teacher at Gleneagle.

“It’s a wonderful and powerful message that we send to the pub-lic that music is important in our school and that we need to sup-port our band programs.”

“I play the Bari [sax]. I like play-ing the low end because playing low notes make me happy,” said Jessica Ye, grade 12.

“The concert was pretty good. Hearing Summit Mid-dle School is really funny be-cause that’s where I came from.”

Gleneagle music students met with exceptional success dur-ing their debut trip to Music Fest Canada in May.

Vocal jazz won a silver and Jazz Band won gold at Music Fest Can-ada, held on Wednesday, May 18.

Edward Trovato, Gleneagle music teacher, is “really pleased with the results” and thinks the students “deserve to be congratulated.”

Kate Beggs, grade 12, and a member of vocal jazz, says Gle-neagle performed extremelywell overall.

Jacqueline Bolster, grade 12, and Kyle Araki, grade 12 won Awards of Merit at the festival.

In addition, both Araki and Michael Kim, grade 11, were of-fered scholarships at the Hum-ber College Jazz Studies Pro-gram in Toronto, following their performance.

Trovato was very happy with the Jazz Band’s performance at the Music Fest. “They absolutely hit their stride; they nailed it,” he said.

In Trovato’s opinion, Vocal Jazz performed well consider-ing the fact that several members were sick and unable to make the festival.

Trovato said “it certainly had an impact on our performance,”

“Powerful,” “incredible,” “hu-morously unexpected,” “like a spaceship ride,” are just a few ways that cast members describe The Breakfast Club.

The drama class had a successful run of their spring play last week.

Ashley Freeborn, director, said, “I would say [this play] is giving a voice to the youth culture… we get this glimpse into a culture that all of us feel so removed from as we grow older.”

The original film, directed by John Hughes in 1984, portrayed youths’ internal conflicts at the time.

“It’s sadly about how youth are alienated and how they feel alone amidst their fami-lies and in the school com-munity,” Freeborn explained.

With a group of strong actors who were very familiar with each other, the cast was able to easily adapt and work well together.

Erin Bodin, grade 12, played Al-lison, who is labelled as “the-bas-ket-case.”

“I kind of took my role as a chal-lenge to be crazy and weird because I’ve never really had this kind of a part before,” Bodin said.

“The hardest part for me was keeping a straight face right when I come on stage.

“I always want to smile at the au-

dience because I know who’s sit-ting there.”

“What makes The Breakfast Club really fantastic is that there’s a mix of really strong personalities from very diverse places,” com-mented Freeborn.

“The kids playing these roles are also that way – they have very strong personalities and they’re all really passionate about what they do.”

Ed Ross, grade 11, who played Brian the nerd said, “We all just seem to be in our roles so easily; I remember in rehearsals, it seemed like we weren’t really doing any work but at the same time, we were still in character bodies.”

Overall, the cast has enjoyed re-hearsing and performing this play.

Alex Zielinski, grade 12, played Andrew’s father.

“I think it’s fun, even though I’ve never actually seen the movie,” he said.According to the group, their greatest struggle was keep-ing focused during each of their rehearsals.

Bodin commented, “We all know each other and we’re all friends, so sometimes we want to have fun and get silly, so we became off task.”

Freeborn said, “At the end of the day, I think they’ve done an excel-lent job. “

“It all came together; I watch in awe at how amazingly talented they all are. They are doing such fantastic work. I’m really proud of them.”

Macy LaoStaff Reporter

Gleneagle’s jazz programs shine at Music Fest Canadabut they were still able to pull it off. Beggs agreed that the Vo-cal Jazz performance went “very well considering the people that were gone.”

Because there were so many absences in Vocal Jazz, Beggs had to take on an additional solo unexpectedly.

“It was nice to have someone impressed by my singing,” said Beggs. One adjudicator was so im-pressed that she offered to “take [Beggs] out for lattes until the cows come home.”

Music Fest Canada is the larg-est music festival in the country. Schools from all across Canada participate, with the majority com-ing from BC and Ontario. The festival was held in Richmond this year.

Normally it is held in Ontario or Quebec, but it has taken place in BC a few times.

This is Gleneagle’s first time participating in the festival. It cost approximately $3100 for the Jazz Band and Vocal Jazz groups to attend.

The PAC helped subsidize the costs, and the rest was paid by the music department.

The costs were very high, so only the Jazz Band and Vocal Jazz groups were able to go.

Endless preparations were in-volved beforehand, both indi-vidually and as a group. “We had to carefully select the pieces; we had to have a variety of styles that

demonstrated their musicality,” said Trovato.

After the Jazz Band’s and Vocal Jazz’s performances, they received feedback from the adjudicators.

Beggs thought “it was good to hear things that we need to im-

prove on for future concerts.” Trovato wants people to rec-

ognize that “music’s not a fluff course.” He believes students truly benefit from a variety of activities in high school.

“[Students] may not remember

their final exam mark, but they’re going to remember [experiences such as] Music Fest Canada,” claims Trovato.

He is proud of the fact that “stu-dents really respect the arts in this school.”

Band hits high note at Rocky PointAs she listened to the Summit

band playing Funky Town, she added, “Yup, we played that too.”

“The concert went pretty well,” said Benny Fang, grade 12.

“I play the tenor sax. They have this really good bass sound and I like playing with the trombones. I think that it sounds really nice.

“I think that the festival is re-ally good because we can listen to the other schools and see some of their music,” Fang added.

It’s a very good chance to get to play and I wish that we got more chances,” said Angela Chi, a French horn player, grade 10.

“We’re going to be performing a variety of music, basically some of the music that we did in Cuba. All the music is challenging and fun in their own unique ways,” said Trovato.

If the students had to pick [their favourite], it would probably be Pines of Rome. [It] is a … piece of music that was originally written for symphony.

It was written by Ottorino Respighi, a famous Italian com-poser, and it depicts the sound of

a marching band coming from the distance.

“It starts very quietly and it takes a long time for the music to really climax and then it finally ends,” said Trovato.

And it’s not only the Rocky Point festival that Gleneagle’s music program participates in.

“We have several district events over the school year and each one highlights a different part of our music programs,” said Trovato.

“We have a Christmas sing-a-long , and a spring sing-a-long which includes all the choirs from the district, this one which is the concert band festival, and the last one of the year is the jazz night which includes all our jazz groups, the jazz band and vocal jazz,” con-tinued Trovato. “So throughout the year, we try to highlight our music groups at these district festivals.

“It’s great. I think that we’re the only, if not [one of the ] few, dis-tricts in the province that still does anything like this,” he added.

The final band concert of the year will be held at Gleneagle on Thurs-day, June 9, 2011.

Sometimes it’s hard to smile: Grade 11 and grade 12 students evoke the ambivalent mood in this year’s spring play, The Breakfast Club.

Tamara BabcockStaff Reporter

Helen DooStaff Reporter

Exploring teenage psyche: The Breakfast Club resonates

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